


be now like the wolf

by LovelyLessie



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types
Genre: Childbirth, Gen, Introspection, Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-23
Updated: 2015-08-23
Packaged: 2018-04-16 20:17:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,973
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4638789
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LovelyLessie/pseuds/LovelyLessie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Morrigan readies herself in the last days before the birth of her child.</p>
            </blockquote>





	be now like the wolf

_You have been a cat before,_ she tells herself,  _which stalks through shadows, which hunts her prey amidst the underbrush; which watches and waits and kills quickly and viciously. You have been sharp teeth and sharp claws, eyes that shine in the darkness, ears that hear all sounds._

_‘Tis not such a challenge, then, to be like the cat now; to draw on her strength and wisdom even in your own skin._

So she heads deeper into the wood and deeper into the mountains, away from the roads, away from the paths, away from all traces of human life. It feels oddly like coming home, to find the most isolated place she can, where no man walks. 

Like the cat she seeks out shelter there, comes across a clearing where an old tree has fallen and makes her camp there. ‘Tis a long time now since she’s slept in the same place twice; she’s been traveling every day, keeping to the woods, keeping out of sight.

Now, like the cat, she builds herself a home for the coming days, lays out her bed and tucks her few possessions away in the space beneath the tree’s trunk. She clears away the brush to make a fire pit and gathers twigs and branches for kindling, strikes down limbs from the fallen tree and splits them into fire logs. She stacks it all nearby, within easy reach, and starts a fire to warm her tiny shelter.

Here, she can be hidden; here, she can be safe until the time comes. Here she can make her preparations and shield herself from harm and from discovery. Here she can wait.

Below her heart she feels the child shift, and she imagines it stretching, stirring, a sleeping figure on the verge of waking. 

“Soon,” she murmurs as she lays herself down beside the fire. “Soon.”

* * *

She spends the next day hunting and foraging, though both are harder tasks than ever. She’s been gathering food as she’s come across it for the past weeks, cooking and eating it when she gets it, but she knows in the coming days she’ll be unable to do so, and she needs to be prepared.

Hunting, especially, is inconvenient and ungainly; it has always been so simple for her to simply take another form to do it, to become the hawk, the bear, the lynx, to find and chase and rend with teeth and nails. But in her own skin, she has neither fangs nor claws prepared to cut, nor the speed and agility for the chase in any condition, let alone eight months with child. 

 _You cannot be the wild beast,_ she tells herself,  _but you are still a wild woman; you know the ways of the forest, you know its secret paths and trails, you know its scurrying small creatures and its great powers. Be instead like the Wilders; you are of their land, too, and born of their blood._

And so she stalks the forest, gathers nuts and roots and ripe berries where she finds them, and when she tracks down some prey - slender deer, fat quail, trembling nugs - she lashes out with magic just enough to wound, extends her will into their veins and stops their hearts to take them as her own.

She returns to her camp with food enough to feast, by day’s end, but she does not; she boils venison on the bone to make stew and drinks it beside the fire with the book spread out before her in the flickering light. 

There are spells upon spells in its pages, charms and curses, potions, poisons - but the only ones she cares for now are spells of protection, of secrecy, of warding. Spells to keep her camp safe from intrusion or discovery. Spells to keep her hidden from the watchful eyes she knows will seek her one day soon.

She hopes, of course, that she has months yet - perhaps even years - before that time will come. But better to be prepared now; better to be ready. ‘Tis more than her own life at stake now, and the soul seeded in her swollen stomach is too precious to leave any risk at all that Flemeth will reach it.

And Flemeth’s will aside, there are other dangers of which she must be wary. Too many things in the world might seek to hurt a vulnerable witch or her child.

“No harm will come to you,” she tells the child, willing her conviction to power each ward she’s built up around the camp. “That I swear to you.”

* * *

There’s a stream not far from her camp where the water runs pure and clean and cold, and when she travels along its bank she finds a sheltered place where it spills over a pile of stones and forms a pool in between two hills, before it goes on down the mountainside. 

The cascade stirs the water in the pool, but the rest of the surface is so still it could be glass, and when she kneels beside it to drink she catches sight of her reflection in the quiet water.

Were anyone to see her now, she thinks, she would seem more lawless and untamed than ever when she lived in the Wilds. She’s barefoot and covered in dirt, her hair unkempt and tangled, her swollen breasts barely half-covered, her shins and forearms scratched and scraped by months of rough traveling. 

Beyond that, though, she thinks her face has changed - her cheeks grown thinner, her eyes deeper. 

She was little more than a child when she left home, a year and odd months past by now. And, of course, ‘tis true that she can no longer be a girl; if nothing else, she must be a woman before she can be a mother. Yet it surprises her to see it in her face, how she’s changed and grown across the past months.

Briefly, she wonders if her mother is in her reflection, and studies it trying to decide. Is there something of Flemeth in the shape of her eye, in the downwards pull of her lip, in the angle of her cheekbones? She isn’t certain.

Shaking the thought away, she undresses and slips into the pool. The cold is bracing, and she draws a sharp breath. Nevertheless, ‘tis a relief to feel it wash over her, to sweep the sweat and grime from her skin, to caress her aching feet and weary limbs.

She pulls down the snarled mess of her hair and submerges herself completely for a moment to soak it. With her fingers she works through the knots, little by little, until it’s sleek and smooth again.

When she emerges from the pool, cleansed of dirt and wear, her face refreshed, her cuts and bruises washed up, she almost feels as if she could be part of civilized society again. If not for her face - for even now her eyes are wild. There is something of the bear in her face now, something of the raven, something of the wolf. 

 _You’re the Witch of the Wilds,_  she tells herself as she turns away. _You’ve been called that name before, but it was never yours. It could not be. Not until now. Not until you were free._

She presses her palms against her belly until she can feel a heartbeat, and wonders if it’s hers or the child’s, or if they’re one and the same. 

 _If you be wild,_  she thinks,  _be wild. Nature bows to nothing. Nor must you._

* * *

In the next days she rests, keeping to her camp, only leaving to wash in the pool or to gather more food, and once every evening to scout for signs of others nearby, making sure her shelter will be safe. 

While she rests, she reads the book, diligently poring over her mother’s spiderweb handwriting. It occurs to her, on the third day there, that there’s a list of potions she could make use of - potions Flemeth likely invented and perfected to make her other daughters easier to bear. 

She halfway entertains the thought of brewing them, but in the end turns it away. She neither needs nor wants help of any kind from her mother - not in carrying the child nor in caring for it.

But she does renew the spells around her camp, and add on to them as she uncovers new ones which suit her purposes. If there is one lesson she learned well, it’s the importance of protecting herself in whatever way she can.

While she rests, the sleeping child stirs faintly in her belly. She sleeps when she can, wakes to the feeling of its feet kicking under her ribs. 

“I’m waiting,” she murmurs, resting the heels of her hands there to feel it. “And I’m so very eager to meet you.”

The morning it begins she breaks her fast with an apple and a bowl of broth before she makes her final preparations in the camp. She pulls the rolled-up cloths from her pack and spreads them out across the ground, one over the other; she refreshes the wards around her camp a final time.

Slowly, she makes her way to the stream with the empty water pitcher to fill it, though every few moments she has to stop that she can brace herself against waves of pain. When she reaches the bank she knees to wash her face in the cool water, and fills the pitcher to the brim, and slowly carries it back to camp to keep beside her.

 _You have been a wolf,_  she tells herself as the ache digs deeper and deeper, as her muscle convulse, as her breath comes to her in ragged, pained gasps.  _You have been tooth and nail and the smell of the woods; you have been a hunter; you have run with the packs in the Wilds and seen with those eyes and howled at the moon as one of them._

_Be like the wolf now, even in your own skin. Be you strong, though you lie here alone in your den. Do not cry nor scream; do not be afraid. You have work to do, and your body knows it; your instinct is sharp. Even in your own skin you cannot lose that._

* * *

In the early hours of the morning, just before dawn, she pushes herself upright so that she can lift the child into her arms.

The babe hiccups and begins to cry, and she lets out a slow, shuddering breath as she pulls him to her chest. “Hush,” she murmurs, laying back against the trunk of the fallen tree for support. With one hand she wipes clean his crumpled face, and bends her head to kiss his brow. 

‘Tis a few moments before she finds the strength to rise again, and she cradles him carefully in the crook of one arm, whispering soothing sounds to quiet him.

With her dagger, she carefully severs the cord that binds them still together, and the blood they’ve shared throughout these long months spills to the ground. 

He’s no longer crying now, but calm, curled up in her grasp as if he’s nearly sleeping. She pulls away her cowl to bear her breasts and leans back again, letting her head fall against the solid trunk behind her. She’s shaking, still breathing hard, still drenched in sweat from the exertion of labor, but she brings a hand to his face and guides his head to her teat so he can suckle there.

“Kieran,” she murmurs tenderly, caressing his head as he feeds. “I’ve waited so long to hold you.” She smiles wearily at him, stroking his fine dark hair. “Ah, you know not who you are now, child,” she breathes, “not even with so old a soul sleeping in you. But you will, Kieran. One day, you will.”


End file.
